Step Seven: Estimate Validation and Review
Step Seven: Estimate Validation and Review
At this point in the process, your estimate should already be reasonably good-but it may not be as good as you think. It is important to verify your methods and your results in a step called validation, which is simply a systematic confirmation of the integrity of an estimate. By validating the estimate, you can be more confident that your data is sound, your methods are effective, your results are accurate, and your focus is properly directed.
It may be tempting to skip this review due to a lack of time, personnel or budget, and there is the unappealing possibility that a close examination may reveal faults in the logic of your process. Nevertheless, the costs involved in performing a proper validation will be dramatically less than the cost overruns that are likely to develop during a poorly managed software project.
There are many ways to validate an estimate. Both the process used to build the estimate and the estimate itself must be evaluated. Ideally, the validation should be performed by someone who was not involved in generating the estimate itself, who can view it objectively. The analyst validating an estimate should employ different methods, tools and separately collected data than were used in the estimate under review.
